Day 4— Teaching Strategies - Constructive



What strategies work for you? Why?

Visual Organizers


Visual Organizers are perfect for brain-storming before the lesson is introduced and for review purposes, which like a Frayer Model introduced in math camp. I will definitely use it for Minds On for math terms.


Fermi Problem


I love Fermi Problems. To solve a Fermi Problem is like to have the power to be a superman or super woman: to accomplish a task that seems impossible. It’s a lot of fun. In the middle, you have to be brave to take assumptions. And then you can use your super power- math skills and other life skills to solve the problem. It’s easy to combine students’ interest with math skills through Fermi problem.

There are several characteristics of good Fermi problem:
- open ended
- no clear final answer
- requires a wide range of skills
- interesting

For example: How many hours do all Canadians spend on playing video games every week?



Mathematics & Story

I am a story lover; I think it’s cool to combine stories with mathematics. I am surprised how many resources we can use. For example, Ann LeSage’s resources:

And J. Hill’s Idea - Student created stories
The stories are easy to be applied to math classes and easy to be modified for different grades.

Which strategy would you hesitate to use? Why?


Mathematics & Drama


I believe in the power of drama, which is so involving and entertaining. I bet kids will love it, because even me, an adult, is attracted to the drama video: we used to roll... :-D But I would hesitate to use it, because it needs a lot of equipments: camera, computer, and video player, maybe also smart board and projector. In my opinion, it’s a challenge to students and to school.